


Arabian Night

by lindacornett



Category: Man From U.N.C.L.E.
Genre: F/M, one possible adult extension of Arabian Affair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-30
Updated: 2014-07-30
Packaged: 2018-02-11 00:38:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2046402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lindacornett/pseuds/lindacornett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The yellow-haired stranger and Sulador's daughter decide they really can get along after the conclusion of the Arabian Affair.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arabian Night

“The _girl_ would like to help with the _leg_.”

The phrase echoed in his head, the tribal chief’s oddly suggestive cadence supported by the drumming and shouts from the campfire outside. 

Well, here he was in the familiar tent again. After the tedium of the “mop up” at the Thrush facility, he’d joined in the wild dancing and shouting, caught up in the elation of the tribesmen celebrating a rare, clear victory in a life of hardship and small defeats. 

Napoleon, too, had capered wildly, attempting at one point to organize a conga line with little success. He was now joined by a chaste handkerchief to a plump mother of three who had calmed his dancing into something resembling a waltz. 

Even the Thrush retiree had joined in, still in his rented tuxedo – Hazel would be appalled at its condition. After encountering Thrush’s unsympathetic plans for his retirement, the man was clearly delighted by the respect he was shown in the camp as an elder. He had finally fallen asleep sprawled against a pile of blankets. 

As Kuryakin’s own adrenalin high wound down, that option looked very appealing. “The leg” agreed, demanding a rest and perhaps a bit of first aid. He patted his thigh carefully, sympathetically. The poor thing had been knocked around a bit today, made to do more than it was ready for. Blood from the knife wound had soaked through the rough bandage and the borrowed trousers. This had been regarded as a badge of honor by the tribe, as though he had taken the wound in the glorious battle rather than from a knife thrown by one of their own. History already rewritten – well, it was a concept he was long familiar with. 

He tried a rubbery step forward and suddenly, silently “the girl,” Sophie, was there, a warmly supportive hand against his back. “You are tired?” she asked, her lips so close her breath tickled his ear. Trying to be heard over the noises of celebration, or preparing to fulfill her father’s suggestion? He eased away and nodded, realizing he was also, perhaps, just a little drunk, for there had been a good deal of something that tasted foul and flowed directly to the brain.

“Hungry?” Oh, yes, he was hungry. The aroma of roasting goat had drifted from a separate cook fire for hours. Only strict courtesy and the knowledge that Napoleon would never let him hear the end of it had kept him from slipping to that other fire and digging in before it was offered. 

“I have brought you this,” she murmured, close behind him again. Her arm wrapped around his waist, her free hand holding a bowl filled with strips of meat, still steaming. He moaned and she laughed softly against his back. “Sit, sit,” she said, gesturing toward the bed, piled invitingly with what must have been all the pillows the camp had to offer. He felt his eyebrows creeping upward. 

Still, if this was a trap, he was prepared to fall in. At least far enough to fill his stomach and get off his aching leg. He dropped awkwardly onto the low cot, hissing at the jolt of pain that produced. She tsked, resting the bowl on his belly and lifting his legs onto the bed. 

“Eat,” she ordered, watching him with hands on her hips. He obeyed. Was there anything served in any of Napoleon’s exquisitely expensive restaurants to compete with freshly killed meat hot from a fire? Belatedly, he realized she also had probably not eaten for many hours. He held the half-empty bowl toward her, praying she would understand that the gesture was about food. Women had a disturbing tendency to assign metaphorical meaning to the most innocent gestures.

She smiled and took a rather large chunk, one with a lovely burned crust on one side. He watched her push the meat into her mouth and chew luxuriously. Stifling a sigh, he picked a lesser chunk and did the same. They shared the food back and forth until it was gone. 

She took the bowl from him and set it aside. “And now, perhaps the filthy hero of Arabia would enjoy a bath?” she said, quoting the insult she had thrown at him… was it just the night before? As a matter of fact, the filthy hero would love a clean up. He smelled of smoke and sweat and horse, blood and the acrid aroma of that damned Thrush chemical. She ducked outside and returned moments later with a bucket of water, a smoke of steam swirling around its surface. She pulled the tent flap closed behind her. A slightly muffled shout came from outside – random enthusiasm or a comment on the significance of the closed tent flap?

She set the bucket beside the bed and regarded him again. He stared back, uncertain what was expected. “Ah, I think I can manage this on my own,” he said finally, inclining his head toward the door. 

She snorted, ignoring the suggestion, and grabbed his foot. “You. Can. Not,” she said, tugging the borrowed, ill-fitting boot off with quick jerks that produced another hiss of pain. She winced in sympathy and regret.

“You see,” she said gently, “you are injured. And you have behaved bravely, and you deserve the poor hospitality an elderly, unmarried woman can offer.” 

His turn to wince at the quoted insult, this time from him. “That was a remarkably unkind thing for me to say,” he said. “And untrue.”

With an impatient toss of her head she stepped back and spread her arms, inviting him to recognize the truth of the words. 

“Untrue,” he repeated, and to Kuryakin’s democratic tastes it was. She was several years past prime, as her tribe defined it, but hardly elderly. There was still a friendly curve to her hip and breast and he had experienced her strength and energy. And, in the moments when she allowed a softer mood to move her, her face glowed with an exotic appeal. Not beautiful but … she had very nice hair. He welcomed the tribe’s casual disregard of the religious rules about women keeping their heads covered – or perhaps it was just Sophie refusing to be ruled, even by God. 

She was approaching again and he sat up, struggling his way out of the long white robe that Napoleon had referred to as a dress. The heavy belt. He was sitting on the hem of the long shirt and before he could get it off, Sophie was pulling it roughly over his head like a mother undressing an uncooperative child. His hair must have been spiked by the exercise because she stroked it gently, pushing it off his hot face. 

That left only his trousers. He fumbled quickly at the waist. “I really can bathe myself,” he said, a little desperately. 

Sophie turned away, ruffling through a chest in the corner. With a dramatic gesture she pulled out a glowing silk scarf that arced through the air, lighter than flower petals, more scarlet than pomegranates. It would have been lovely on her dark hair. She laid it over him, a diaphanous cover from waist to ankles. 

“You are _hayiyy_ ,” she diagnosed, using a word he didn’t recognize – time to update his middle Eastern vocabulary. Seeing his confusion, she ducked her head and pulled a corner of the scarf over her face. 

Ah. “ _Embarrassé_ ,” he suggested, starting with French. “ _Avergonzado. Sıkılgan._ Shy …”

“Shy,” she interrupted the diversion firmly. Kneeling by the cot, she slid her hands under the scarf. With her usual ruthless efficiency, in moments she had the trousers unfastened and was sliding them down and carefully off the injured leg. She held them up, shaking her head at the bloodstain. 

“Sorry,” he murmured. 

“It is no matter,” she said. “I am only sorry that you were injured.” Which might have been as close to an apology as she had ever uttered. 

She folded the trousers carefully and set them aside before kneeling by the cot. She slid the scarf aside to expose the bloodied bandage and pulled out her knife. 

“If you cut the leg off, you’ll never get your camel,” he joked feebly.

“Just the bandage.” She sawed diligently at the cloth and he realized she was trying to spare him the pain of unwrapping it. He concentrated on her head bent over his leg, the thick hair curving voluptuously against the cot. It would be soft, he thought, and strong. Rapunzel hair – a man could wrap it around his hand and climb to some rich prize. He uncurled his fingers and forced his hand to remain on his stomach. 

The exposed wound wasn’t too bad, a little swollen, a little red, but with none of the threatening streaks of color and the odor that meant infection. It had stopped bleeding. It should have been stitched, but given the tools at hand he wasn’t going to suggest it. It would leave an ugly scar, but he was past fretting about the cosmetics of his scars.

“Air will be good for it,” Sophie decided. “I had a goat once that was injured by another’s hoof. The wound was not unlike this and it healed well.”

He bleated plaintively. She looked up in surprise and laughed. She had a rather nice laugh, although a bit rusty. “Careful,” she whispered, nodding toward the tent flap. “You’ll give them even more to talk about.” 

She dipped a bit of cloth in the pail of water and leaned toward his face. “Be easy,” she murmured and ran the soft cloth over his forehead and cheeks, eyes and mouth. The water smelled of sandalwood and felt wonderful. 

“Mmmmm,” he rumbled, eyes closed. 

Shoulders. Arms, one then the other, thorough and gentle. He let her manipulate his joints, support his tired muscles. She paid careful attention to each finger. He was warm and then cool as the desert air dried the scented water. Chest. Stomach. She even teased a corner of the cloth into his belly button, a curiously arousing intimacy. 

“Up,” she commanded, sliding an arm behind his shoulders and pulling him off the pillows. He let his body fall forward, resting his head on a slightly raised knee, while she washed his back. She tsked again and there was the muted pain of a bruise on his left side being probed. “Not broken,” she said. He could have told her if he’d had a broken rib he would not be in this position, but the goat is not expected to comment. 

She eased him back and moved to his feet. Half wash, half marvelous massage. Her small brown fingers on his white skin. She frowned, focused as diligently as a child determined to do a new task properly. “Any man would be lucky to come home to you,” he murmured and belatedly realized it might sound like an invitation. He started to sit up, mouth opening for a clarification.

“Sit,” she said. “Be easy. You think I am hoping for a promise from you? I am not stupid. I know that tomorrow morning the big airplane will fly away and you will be on it and I will not.” She shrugged, digging into his instep fiercely with her thumb.

“Surely the daughter of Sulador could have her pick of men in the camp,” he suggested. “If none of them please, there are others on the trade routes.”

She moved up to his calves with the cloth. “There have been offers,” she said. “This surprises you?”

“Of course not …”

“It surprises you,” she said. “But it is true. When I was young, there were several who hoped to gain a wife and a camel in one transaction. I was not ready to be ruled. Even now, there is one. Halim – you remember him?”

He shook his head. “There were many men in the battle.”

“He was there, but he would not have drawn your attention. He was one of the two who attacked you.”

“The one who hit me?” he asked, remembering the twin pains in his leg and his jaw. 

“The one who watched you being hit. He is not a good fighter. He is a gentle man, good with children and animals. You know the meaning of his name?”

Kuryakin ran through a mental dictionary. “’Mild, patient.’ He sounds like a good husband.” 

She sighed and raised his injured leg carefully to wash behind the knee. “Perhaps. But I think in a marriage it is best if the husband, and not the wife, is the warrior.”

They were silent for a few moments while she very gently washed around the wound. She rinsed the cloth and moved higher, pushing the scarf aside. 

“Ah, and if the husband is a warrior?” he asked quickly, trying to avoid squirming. 

“Then, I think, we would spend our marriage in battle.” 

“So, a kind man is too weak and a strong man too much of a challenge. This doesn’t leave you many choices.”

She spat out another word he didn’t recognize and didn’t attempt to translate. “Why do men believe that an unmarried woman is unfinished? My father on his deathbed will try to marry me with the man who is outside digging his grave. Yet my life is not so unhappy.” She gestured with a damp hand. “I have a tent of my own, my own goats. If I grow lonely, I know who is discreet and will not become possessive. Once I trade you for a new camel, my life will be very full, indeed.” He managed a watery smile in response to her grin. 

So, she had made a deliberate decision to live alone. It must have been a difficult path to choose – no husband, no children in a society that valued both above a solitary woman. But, hadn’t he chosen the same life? And Napoleon and many of their colleagues? Easier for them, perhaps, but not easy. Was her acerbic personality a protection against complications, or a reflection of her frustrations? He studied her thoughtfully as she made a last gentle swipe across his uninjured leg.

“And now,” she purred, sliding her hands beneath the scarf, “We will explore whether being a spy prepares a man to be discreet and not too possessive.” 

He drew in a long breath as the wet warmth enclosed him. Her gentle movements were reminiscent of the massage she had given his fingers, but with very different effect. After several productive moments he slid free of her hands. 

“Is the daughter of Sulador _hayiyy_?” he challenged, raising one eyebrow and tugging at her heavy dress. She hesitated long enough that he thought he may have found the limits of her bravado. 

Finally, with a glance toward the still-closed tent flap, she stood and unwound the belt wrapped around her waist. Grasping the bottom of the dress, she stripped it off quickly, threw it aside, trembling in a thin white shift. Then, like the warrior she was, she stripped off the shift and stood before him naked. Her eyes were down, her cheeks flushed and it occurred to him then that her previous encounters, if she had been truthful about them, had probably taken place in the dark, under covers.

Halim in his kindness might have thrown her the scarf. Kuryakin did not. He looked her over, appreciating full hips, full breasts and the black hair that failed to cover them, the dark V of pubic hair. Strong legs. Arms lighter than her wrists and her clenched hands. Her skin was smooth, the color of the weak tea with honey and heavy cream his mother had given him when he was a child. 

“Your body is pleasing,” he said grandly. When she jerked her head up, he gestured for her to come to the cot. It had the intended effect; her embarrassment was replaced in the instant with a flush of outrage.

Pulling her shoulders back she stalked to the cot and jerked away the last scant coverage of the scarf. Her eyes widened. “Yellow,” she breathed in amazement and it was his turn to flush. 

She tugged at the yellow hair, just firmly enough to remind him that she was not a woman to be summoned. “This alone might be worth a camel,” she said. “People at the markets are very fond of oddities.” 

“Too much talk, woman,” he growled in a passable imitation of her father’s irritated bark. He grasped her wrist and jerked her to fall onto the cot half on top of him. Belatedly, he thought of the injured leg, but she remembered and managed to twist away from it in time. 

He released her and indulged himself by burying his fingers in her thick hair. He grasped the back of her head and pulled her toward him for a kiss. She turned away, frowning. “This is not our way,” she said. 

He shrugged – waste of lips, but an UNCLE agent was expected to respect the mores of the territory he visited. 

He pressed his mouth instead against her neck, feeling the pulse fluttering against his lips, following his tongue along the line of her shoulder, down to the generous plumpness of her breast. He cupped it in his hand. A perfect fit. Napoleon had once made a comment that applied but he couldn’t be bothered to remember it just now. The dark nipple rose to meet his thumb. He dipped his head to curve his tongue around the crinkled nib. Sophie tugged a handful of his hair in appreciation; he pushed her onto her back so he could attend to the other breast. 

He rolled carefully toward her, his half-staff cock nudging hopefully against her hip. He rocked gently and suckled like a child and it was pure pleasure and contentment. He might have drifted into exhausted sleep, but Sophie grasped his hair and pulled his head up. She stared at his damp lips. “Perhaps I will try your way, this time,” she said, and pressed her mouth on his. 

Certainly not expert, but willing, and the fact that this was her first kiss was a powerful aphrodisiac. He hardened further against the hard ridge of her hipbone and the soft skin that covered it. In a moment …

She shoved him to his back. “You are too heated,” she said with a breathlessness that indicated the condition was mutual. She reached across him, bringing up the dripping cloth and wrapped it around his cock. No massage this time, just the cooling water and her firm grip. 

He leaned forward and returned to her lips, instructing. Mimic, practice, repeat – she was an apt student and soon they were both heated again. 

She fell back, pulling the cloth from him and holding it over her own chest and letting the droplets fall on her damp skin. 

He took it from her and created a silvery trail between her breasts and down. He allowed the droplets to fill the small cup of her bell button. She shivered as the cooling water overflowed and traced down across her hip. 

He moved the cloth lower, still not touching her. Droplets glittered in her pubic hair, disappeared into the angle of her closed legs. The scent of sandalwood rose from her body. 

She grasped his hand and pulled the cloth down to her crotch, squeezing a last gush of water from the cloth. “Aaaaah,” she sighed. 

“Aaaah,” he echoed and tried awkwardly to bend down far enough to follow the water with his tongue. 

“No.” Sophie the warrior taking charge again. She rose, pushing him unresisting onto his back. “A wise man knows what he is not capable of,” she scolded. She smiled, eyeing his erection. “And what he is.”

She swung a leg over, carefully avoiding the wound, and sat up, her hands pressed against his chest. Her body dripped water onto him, another peculiar intimacy, the precious liquid moving from his body to hers and back again. 

“And now,” she said, a note of question in her voice. He nodded and she slid slowly onto him, taking him into her heat. Her hips swayed gently, a cuddling gesture, until he was fully inside her. 

She tightened her internal muscles, watching his face for his pleased reaction. She began moving again, a slow side-to-side rocking that recreated the tireless motion of traveling atop a camel. So, he had finally come round to this role. He almost laughed at the thought. 

Sophie’s eyes were closed, her head thrown back and the hair falling so far behind her that it tickled his thighs. 

He could let her ride him to a slow completion, but it wasn’t his nature to be so passive. 

He spread his hands on her hips, slid them down to her thighs. His thumbs parted her labia. One sought and found the small hardness, a jewel wrapped in velvet. She gasped, her eyes jerking open.

“Be easy,” he murmured, concentrating, pressing. He manipulated the small bud, strongly and then gently and then releasing it completely. 

“More.” And so he gave her more, and raised his hips as much as he could. She took the cue and began moving again, rocking faster. Faster. This was the exhilaration of riding the white stallion toward battle, faster than thought and nearly losing control, rider and mount each relying on the strength and speed of the other in their joint flight. 

When the acute pleasure washed through him, he closed his lips firmly. Discreet. But Sophie, back arched, issued a ringing ululation, full of joy and defiance. When she sagged against his chest, breathing hard, it was the only sound. The drumming and calls of the celebrating tribe recalled their presence by their sudden absence. For the first time Kuryakin wondered if Sulador would be as willing for him to climb aboard the big airplane. And then Sulador’s voice: “Dance! Who will dance with Sulador?” and the drums began again. 

Sophie pushed herself up slowly, face and throat flushed, hair wild, eyes glistening, and in that moment she was beautiful. 

“Perhaps,” she whispered as she settled in beside him, “I will reconsider whether two warriors can make one another happy.”


End file.
